FUTURE MANUFACTURING
Visual Inspection – how artificial intelligence can help you cut costs
ANKE ROSER
One of the challenges for manufacturers is to detect and quickly rectify errors during the production process . In this way , they can reduce scrap and lower their material costs . Artificial intelligence in the form of Visual Inspection enables them to do just that .
Artificial intelligence ( AI ) has the potential to significantly increase the productivity , safety and resource efficiency of manufacturing processes . Which is why Google Cloud , for example , recently introduced a new solution that engineers can use in manufacturing . No data specialists or additional integration codes are needed to help man- ufacturers drive their first digital transformation projects . As a Google Cloud Global partner , GFT Technologies has tested and implemented the solution with leading automotive and manufacturing companies and contributed its own expertise .
One specific application example is the production process of a glass manufacturer : the AI-supported system automa- tically checks freshly moulded bottles for more than 15 different defects when they leave the 700-degree furnace . With the aid of infrared thermal imaging cameras , Visual Inspection takes a close look at specific areas of each bottle . Thanks to pretrained inspection models , it immediately detects any defects before the next process begins . This means that defective
Sources : shutterstock
The completeness check examines whether all components are present and correctly positioned . In this case , the AI system makes a comparison with a reference image that has been defined as perfect .
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